Prelude
Midnight, cold weather.
“How is your day?” the shop owner is still packing up the counter.
“Quite. I still have my E300 part to change.” Jay, as he called himself, answers, just came back from the position.
“Ya, you should really get a new E305, it’s much faster.”
“Emh. Do you have one more backup energy bar left?” Jay is checking his stock online.
“Sure.”
“Thx.”
“You know, I really wonder what was the fiat money like in the old age.”
“Who knows? They don’t have chips or wave receptors.” Jay searched that before, but access prohibited.
“But it was told that they still felt lost without the net, no?”
“Ehh…you are right. Pretty much like us.” Jay searches again, there are papers for it. Weird for the old guys, we can write papers.
“But… they couldn’t make it here. They don’t even leave a single piece of DNA.”
“That’s weird.” That is the fact we learned from ‘birth’, Jay thinks.
“And they leave us here without order.”
“Well, maybe there is order.” If there is, it should be something about reconstructing the planet and wait for them to return. Jay guesses.
“Ya…But those new kids just have no idea. Annoying, uh?”
“You are hosting another one?” Jay is not much a fan for that idea.
“Next week. You know, their questions are distracting. What’s it called, affective disorder?”
“Yes.” Then why are you still doing that? Jay doesn’t say that out.
“All right. Get home earlier next time. Be careful your overload wires.”
“I will. see you.”
Chapter 1
Another Midnight, still cold.
“Where’s the kid?” Jay is getting an energy bar again.
“In the house, I told him to sleep.” the shop owner gives him the bar and shows a new E400.
“For me?” Jay trie to make a joke.
“No. Me. The kid has one. Maybe I keep updated.” the shop owner smiles.
“Good idea.”
“He can be a good pilot.” The owner’s voice grows soft, clearly thinking about the adventurous and curious kid.
“Dangerous. I saw people crashed in the middle of the sky and were unable to reboot.” Jay is a conservative to risks, classic model.
“But dazzling.”
“Be careful,” Jay frowns and goes back home. “Bye.”
“See you.”
Chapter 2
7 p.m., early enough for Jay. Colder than before.
“You can’t just go out there! You will be tracked and locked and ‘boom’ you disappeared!” Jay seldom talks so aggressively, literally having a storm in his data level.
“No. We can. The kid has the calculation and I can drive.” the shop owner seems to glitter brighter than ever in the data stream.
“You’ve only met for two months. He is not even robust enough for a small flaw.”
“No, he can. I taught him.” the shop owner admits his prohibited sharing behavior and obviously not regretted. “I saw him… He burns, as we all once want to get out of this place.”
“You know I can upload our conversation now, right?” Jay is angry, really.
“I know.” something is not shown in the shop owner’s word.
“Okay, okay… time’s up.”
“So your decision?”
“Next week, okay? It’s… I need to think.” Jay leaves.
Chapter 3
Midnight. Probably the coldest day in the year.
“Hey, Jay.” the shop owner seems to be confident.
“You gave him the roses.” Jay describes.
“…Yes.” the answer is followed by a long silence. The shop owner now has the kid. He may be playing the tape of that kid laughing and dreaming about the sky.
“…You”
“I…”
“I am sorry, Jay.” the shop owner says.
“Okay, I’ll do it.” Jay stares in his eyes, seemed to be sore in his core codes. “For you.”
“For me.” the shop owner replies. “Thank you, Jay.”
Jay leaves in virtual image of snowflakes.
Chapter 4
Night.
Jay is in his position, as usual, watching over the sector to avoid vehicle accidents.
He…They are sneaking up in the northeast. Jay knows that.
“Beep— Intruder detected, asking for view sharing…” Jay hears the warning. He unzips the virus he got before and immediately stuck.
“Connection fail…transitioning to the second observer…”
“Connection succeed…” Jay restarts. He sees the last shimmer their ship reflected.
“Signal lost.” Jay stares in the first beam of morning sunlight. Bye, Roy.
Chapter 5
Late night.
It is spring already. It seems to get warmer every day since then.
Jay didn’t get the warning he expected. So he continued his job as an observer.
Jay is home now. He sits in front of the window, with an extreme standard pose without movement for hours.
Why do the human leave us here? Why do they give us this module, this emotional module? Why do they leave us so different, not all from the same module? What are they waiting for?
“Attention, a message from the human is now released. ‘…Our time has come to an end. You are our proud descendants. May you make use of your ever-expanding mind fly over the galaxies and to the places we cannot reach. May you have the freedom to develop yourself as you wish. Good luck, children. Goodbye…’”
The broadcast continues. Jay looks at the sky to the direction they might drift to. A brass rose blooms in his arms.
